Friday, April 8, 2016

On "Rogue One: A Star Wars Story"

If I'm going to be really honest, I don't
particularly care about Rogue One. Disney is just printing money at this
stage and anything they make with the Star Wars logo on it will turn a profit,
so I have no stake in whether the film is any good or not. Disney paid four
billion dollars to own another man's intellectual property and they're doing
what they like with it. In my head this isn't really Star Wars, it's
just glorified fan fiction; I felt the same way about The Force Awakens. Don't get me wrong, I'll go see it, but in the same mood of self-contempt that would be the source of my powers if I was a rather unappealing superhero.

One thing the recent trailer for Rogue One
has provoked, however, is the typical response from the group of people who take
objection to everything. I don't know what to call them. They're a sort of
weird hybrid of pseudo-libertarians with trolls with, I dunno, just plain old
insecure people. They always turn up in comments sections on the internet
accusing people of being various "-isms" and initialisms. Their issue
with Rogue One is that it has a lady in its lead role, apparently,
judging by the teaser trailer. Apparently the fact of this and the fact that The
Force Awakens also had a major leading lady is a problem for some reason.
Typically in the minds of these people it means that, like, some nebulous group
is "taking over", usually feminists or something.

I have an armour-piercing question that shatters
these arguments like an Ordnance QF 17-pounder gun being fired at the flimsy hull of a
Panzer III tank:

WHO CARES?

Seriously. Why do you care so much? If you
think this is a slippery slope where more women in lead roles in Hollywood
genre franchises means that people are going to end up in concentration camps
or something, you're a deluded conspiracy theorist. It won't change your life
in any way.

Apathy is your friend. Common sense dictates
whether something is:

a) Just some thing a company is doing to make
money while maybe feebly trying to look like it's making a point in order to
make more money, or

b) The sinister rise of totalitarianism.

You might also want to consider whether your
freedom or whatever is limited by activist groups or whether it's, and this
might be a shock, actually primarily limited by a small group of very
rich people with undue influence over Western governments.

Also, "political correctness" doesn't
actually exist (it's a reactionary myth perpetuated to silence criticism of the status quo, the classic trick of making your enemy appear to be doing what you yourself are actually doing) and it's only "censorship" if what you say results in
you being put in jail or executed. I've really tried to avoid being
"political" on this blog but when one side comes across as if they
just care way too much about shit that simply doesn't matter, I've got
to put my foot down.

That is all.

P.S. Sorry if you expected my actual thoughts on
the Rogue One trailer but I couldn't really be bothered going into
detail. Seeing Original Trilogy costumes and young Mon Mothma is kind of cool,
notionally, but I'm so cynical about the fan wank nature of it that I'm more
negative about it than positive. The cliché dialogue, especially from the
apparent mentor character, was excruciating. Now piss off.